1. Technical Field
The invention relates to the use of social media. More particularly, the invention relates to techniques for analyzing and applying data related to customer interactions with social media.
2. Description of the Background Art
The term ‘social media’ refers to the use of Web-based and mobile technologies to turn communication into an interactive dialogue (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media). FIG. 1 is an example of the share buttons common to many social Web pages. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as “a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content.” (see Kaplan, Andreas M.;
Michael Haenlein (2010); Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of Social Media; Business Horizons 53 (1): 59-68)
Social media are media for social interaction, as a superset beyond social communication. Enabled by ubiquitously accessible and scalable communication techniques, social media substantially change the way of communication between organizations, communities, as well as individuals.
Social media take on many different forms, including Internet forums, Weblogs, social blogs, microblogging, wikis, podcasts, photographs or pictures, video, rating, and social bookmarking. By applying a set of theories in the field of media research, e.g. social presence, media richness, and social processes, e.g. self-presentation, self-disclosure, Kaplan and Haenlein (ibid) created a classification scheme for different social media types. According to Kaplan and Haenlein there are six different types of social media: collaborative projects, e.g. Wikipedia, blogs and microblogs, e.g. Twitter, content communities, e.g. YouTube, social networking sites, e.g. Facebook, virtual game worlds, e.g. World of Warcraft, and virtual social worlds, e.g. Second Life. Technologies include: blogs, picture-sharing, vlogs, wall postings, email, instant messaging, music-sharing, crowd-sourcing, and voice over IP, to name a few. Many of these social media services can be integrated via social network aggregation platforms.
Kietzmann et al. (see Kietzmann, Jan H.; Kris Hermkens, Ian P. McCarthy, and Bruno S. Silvestre (2011); Social media? Get serious! Understanding the functional building blocks of social media; Business Horizons 54 (3): 241-251.) present a honeycomb framework that defines how social media services focus on some or all of seven functional building blocks: identity, conversations, sharing, presence, relationships, reputation, and groups. These building blocks help understand the engagement needs of the social media audience. For instance, LinkedIn users care mostly about identity, reputation, and relationships, whereas YouTube's primary building blocks are sharing, conversations, groups, and reputation.
Kietzmann et al. (ibid) contend that social media presents an enormous challenge for firms, as many established management methods are ill-suited to deal with customers who no longer want to be talked at, but who want firms to listen, appropriately engage, and respond. The authors explain that each of the seven functional building blocks has important implications for how firms should engage with social media. By analyzing identity, conversations, sharing, presence, relationships, reputation, and groups, firms can monitor and understand how social media activities vary in terms of their function and impact, so as to develop a congruent social media strategy based on the appropriate balance of building blocks for their community.
According to the European Journal of Social Psychology, one of the key components in successful social media marketing implementation is building social authority. Social authority is developed when an individual or organization establishes themselves as an expert in their given field or area, thereby becoming an influencer in that field or area. It is through this process of building social authority that social media becomes effective. That is why one of the foundational concepts in social media has become that you cannot completely control your message through social media but, rather, you can simply begin to participate in the conversation expecting that you can achieve a significant influence in that conversation.
However, this conversation participation must be cleverly executed because while people are resistant to marketing in general, they are even more resistant to direct or overt marketing through social media platforms. This may seem counter-intuitive, but is the main reason building social authority with credibility is so important. A marketer can generally not expect people to be receptive to a marketing message in and of itself. In the Edleman Trust Barometer report in 2008, the majority (58%) of the respondents reported they most trusted company or product information coming from “people like me” inferred to be information from someone they trusted. In the 2010 Trust Report, the majority switched to 64% preferring their information from industry experts and academics. According to Inc. Technology's Brent Leary, “This loss of trust, and the accompanying turn towards experts and authorities, seems to be coinciding with the rise of social media and networks.”
It has been observed that Facebook is now the primary method for communication by college students in the U.S. There are various statistics that account for social media usage and effectiveness for individuals worldwide. Some of the most recent statistics are as follows:                Social networking now accounts for 22% of all time spent online in the US. A total of 234 million people age 13 and older in the U.S. used mobile devices in December 2009.        Twitter processed more than one billion tweets in December 2009 and averages almost 40 million tweets per day        Over 25% of U.S. Internet page views occurred at one of the top social networking sites in December 2009, up from 13.8% a year before.        Australia has some of the highest social media usage in the world. In usage of Facebook Australia ranks highest, with over 9 million users spending almost 9 hours per month on the site.        The number of social media users age 65 and older grew 100 percent throughout 2010, so that one in four people in that age group are now part of a social networking site.        As of June 2011 Facebook has 750 Million users        According to a report by Nielson “In the U.S. alone, total minutes spent on social networking sites has increased 83 percent year-over-year. In fact, total minutes spent on Facebook increased nearly 700 percent year-over-year, growing from 1.7 billion minutes in April 2008 to 13.9 billion in April 2009, making it the No. 1 social networking site for the month.”        
The main increase in social media has been Facebook. It was ranked as the number one social networking site. Approximately 100 million users access this site through their mobile phone. According to Nielsen, global consumers spend more than six hours on social networking sites. “Social Media Revolution” produced by Socialnomics author Erik Qualman contains numerous statistics on Social Media, including the fact that 93% of businesses use it for marketing and that if Facebook were a country it would be the third largest. In an effort to supplant Facebook's dominance, Google launched Google+ in the summer of 2011.
Thus, using social media as a form of marketing has taken on whole new challenges. As the 2010 Trust Study indicates, it is most effective if marketing efforts through social media revolve around the genuine building of authority. Someone performing a marketing role within a company must honestly convince people of their genuine intentions, knowledge, and expertise in a specific area or industry through providing valuable and accurate information on an ongoing basis without a marketing angle overtly associated. If this can be done, trust with, and of, the recipient of that information—and that message itself—begins to develop naturally. This person or organization becomes a thought leader and value provider—setting themselves up as a trusted advisor instead of marketer. Top of mind awareness develops and the consumer naturally begins to gravitate to the products and/or offerings of the authority/influencer.
As a result of social media, and the direct or indirect influence of social media marketers, today consumers are as likely, or more likely, to make buying decisions based on what they read and see in platforms we call social, but only if presented by someone they have come to trust. Additionally, reports have shown organizations have been able to bring back dissatisfied customers and stakeholders through social media channels. This is why a purposeful and carefully designed social media strategy has become an integral part of any complete and directed marketing plan but must also be designed using newer authority building techniques.
Given the significance of social media and the potential for influencing consumer behavior, it would be advantageous to develop techniques that quantize community interactions with social media to understand and influence consumer experiences.